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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23390656">Housebound</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendragonfics/pseuds/pendragonfics'>pendragonfics</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel Cinematic Universe, X-Men - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Brotherly Love, Current Events, F/M, M/M, Past Jean Grey/Logan - Freeform, Quarantine, gender neutral reader, light fluff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 15:53:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,611</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23390656</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendragonfics/pseuds/pendragonfics</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>You and your boyfriend Victor are stuck at his brother's house during a quarantine lockdown.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Victor Creed/Reader, Victor Creed/You</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Housebound</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was a Tumblr request!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The nation-wide call for a lockdown happened at the worst time. Well, it could have been worse - well, a lot worse. Yeah, it was unwise to visit Victor’s brother, all things considered. It wasn’t Logan’s fault that he’d found his wife had been cheating on him. It wasn’t his fault that the affair had happened since the 2016 election and that she wasn’t at tennis with her teacher at all.</p><p>Now you three were stuck in a flat.</p><p>“Of all things…” Logan cracked open another beer. At the rate he was going at, there’d be no liquor in two days, let alone the projected lift on the ban.</p><p>“Look, she’ll get what’s coming for her. You know, karma and all that,” you tell Logan, meaning it. When he doesn’t respond, you lean forward and take the bottle.</p><p>Quite unhelpfully, Victor has been staying out of all of this. While he’s not the best negotiator, he’s Logan’s brother and knows him better than you. Throughout lunch, he’d been quiet, near-brooding, patting Logan’s back when he sighed, passing things when he asked for them, grunted in response when conversation asked it of him. You’re not sure if this is because he’s mad that you insisted on helping Logan in this tough spot, or because he’s never really liked his brother, or perhaps, it’s your fault that you’re both stuck here in the one-bedroom flat in the poorer area of town.</p><p>“________,” Logan growls. “Give it back.”</p><p>Victor swipes the beer and returns it to his brother’s hand. “Let the man grieve,” he wrestles Logan to the couch, moving to the TV for something nonsensical to change the mood. “C’mon, bro. Save some beer for the rest of us.”</p><p>You sigh and push yourself up onto the bench. Outside the tiny kitchen window, the streets are bare, and there’s no traffic at all, except for the stray emergency vehicle. You can hear the start-up tone for Netflix as you begin to think of your lonely houseplants.</p><hr/><p>Come ten o’clock when everyone’s eyes felt like sandpaper, Logan retired to the bedroom. With the taste of unusual toothpaste in your mouth, you and Victor looked to the second-hand couch for respite. A couch that had lived a prolific life of stains and tears in its time, spills and thrills from the living rooms it had spent time in. Not counting the night that just had been, it must have lived for years off the arses of its owners. You looked at it with a distaste, thinking how Victor and Logan had spent hours watching something with subtitles that you didn’t catch the name of.</p><p>Victor wasn’t particularly chatty since Logan left the room. Not that he was any time, but anything to break the eerie silence would have been preferable. Thankfully, you had your phone charger with you, and your smartphone was a lovely distraction.</p><p>“You heading to bed?” Victor broke the silence.</p><p>Over your mobile game, you nodded. “I’ll take the floor.” You offered.</p><p>“Nah,” Victor rebutted, “You never know what Logan’s tracked into the carpet.”</p><p>Quietly, you agreed and took the couch. When the light was switched off, it felt less intimidating. Perhaps darkness was the best reveal of true strength, or maybe the anxiety of it all had caught up with you. Either way, you felt exhausted, but not too tired to reach for your boyfriend’s hand in the dark.</p><p>“What are you doing?” he grumbled, following the sound of him turning over.</p><p>“I -,” you stop, backtracking, “um. Good night.”</p><hr/><p>There’s nothing fresh left to eat after, other than the health food that was slowly turning to mould in the bottom of the fridge. Logan hadn’t stocked up a lick of anything, except for the beer, and frozen chips and gravy. Maybe homemade poutine was his comfort food, but it wasn’t something sustainable for any of you three.</p><p>Thankfully Jean had apples that were days away from turning bad, and with what ingredients you could find in the pantry, it was clear that there was only one way to make best of a bad situation: and that was by making apple pie. While Victor scrolled on new sites for any updates to the world news, Logan was watching through his boxset reruns of <em>Everybody Loves Raymond</em>. Leaving you to your messing around in the kitchen, complete with your headphones playing your favourite music to block out any negative thoughts.</p><p>By midday, you’d crafted pastry by hand. Lumpy, but pretty good for your first ever attempt at that sort of baking. By five, the apple pie was warm on the bench, growing colder beneath the window.</p><p>Quietly, you unplug your earphones and look around the apartment. The boys have moved since you last saw them, and tired, you trudge to the bathroom for a long shower to commemorate your success. Maybe, if you’re lucky, Logan’s cheating wife would have left some nice shampoo and body wash for you to filch.</p><p>You’ve been away from yours and Victor’s shared place for two days now, and it feels strange. It feels like you’re stuck at a sleepover, or it’s like that bit between Christmas and New Years’ Eve, or something else liminal. By the time you get out the shower and change, you go back out to check on the pie.</p><p>It’s still there. But, minus a sixth.</p><hr/><p>When Victor asks what’s wrong, you ignore him. Partly, that’s because you know there’s a chance that he’s the one who robbed your pie. Partly, it’s because lately, he’s been distant with you, and some part of you, a petty part of you, wants back at him. Logan doesn’t notice the pie, and Victor doesn’t talk about it. You’re silent, waiting. But it’s not brought up.</p><p>If you hadn’t already taken a shower, you’d go back in there and cry under the showerhead for a solid five minutes unhindered.</p><p>But when Logan makes his cheese-less poutine for dinner, you three all eat in silence in front of the seven o’clock headlines. When everyone’s ready for sleep, you wait. You know you’re the last awake when both brothers’ snores are reverberating in the room, and it’s then when you finally let it out.</p><p>At first, it’s just about the pie. You’re upset that one of them took from you without asking and didn’t bring it up or apologise at all. You’re upset that Victor isn’t talking to you. You’re upset that you haven’t slept in your bed in so long, and you miss your things. But then, you realise that you’re worried about the goings-on in the world. The unknown of it all. The fact that there’s no idea of what’s going to happen other than what you know -</p><p>“Babe are you crying?” you hear Victor murmur.</p><p>Sniffling, you wipe at your eyes, even though it’s dark, you try to roll away. But you feel Victor’s arm on yours, and suddenly he’s holding you in his arms. You’re caught by surprise, and the next sob comes out a little louder, but he’s holding you tight, and you cry into the crook of his shoulder, feeling the negativity come out.</p><p>“Tell me what’s wrong,” he says after a while.</p><p>“Everything is -,” you stop to cry some more, “I don’t know what’s happening! Logan’s not talking to me, and you’re distant and my pie -,”</p><p>Victor tilts your head with his hands, and in the darkness, you can barely see his face. But he kisses you, his lips dusting your face with the tears that had already fallen. While your boyfriend is never the most communicative, you could always rely on him, especially when life got you down.</p><p>“Logan’s Logan. He’ll get over himself. I’ve been packing up Jean’s stuff with him, and it’s…not easy for him.” Victor explains quietly. In the next room, you can still hear Logan’s snores reverberating through the shared wall. “and I’m sorry I’m distant. I pick up other people’s feelings, you know that.”</p><p>“You’re a nightmare to bring to a funeral,” you reminisce, sniffling.</p><p>“And Logan took your pie slice. He did it and felt bad, but he’s the worst at owning up, so hold it against him so we have leverage for next time he does you wrong, okay?” Victor snorts, and you chuckle back in response.</p><p>“I don’t want to blackmail him,” you moan. “I…I just want you to be proud I made a pie.”</p><p>“According to Lo, it’s the best pie he’s ever had,” Victor cheers you. A beat passes, and he kisses your cheeks once more. There are fewer tears there now, and his smooches are less watery. But they’re tempered, well-placed, and soon enough, your breathing is almost normal, and the tears have almost stopped falling. “and the thing is, babe…nobody knows what’s happening,” he whispers. “in the world.”</p><p>“Nobody?” you ask.</p><p>“Yeah. But that’s okay.” He exhales, and you lean closer.</p><p>You wrap your arms around him, bringing him close to you. The authorities have said to stay apart, but you’re a unit. You live together, even when you’re not at his brother’s house. You’ve been with him for years, and years and there’s no way you can part now.</p><p>“Yeah?” you prompt.</p><p>“Yeah.” Slowly, Victor takes you from the couch and lowers you onto the floor where he’s set up to sleep. You pull the comforter you had off with you, and together, you snuggle in each other’s arms. “…I mean, the world is big, but we’re all in this together.”</p><p>“Are you quoting <em>High School Musical </em>to me?” you ask him.</p><p>Victor’s arms around you are warm and comforting. “I’d do nothing less for you.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>You can find me on Tumblr on as @chaotic--lovely, and if you want to request a fic, check out <a href="https://pendragonfics.tumblr.com/request_conditions">@pendragonfics</a>! ʕ·ᴥ·ʔ✿</p></blockquote></div></div>
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